"‘Path is the key:’ The Doors’ drummer on what lights his fire" PBS NewsHour 12/06/2020
Excerpt
SUMMARY: 50 years ago this month, The Doors played its final show in New Orleans. For the band's drummer, John Densmore, the ensuing years have been a continued artistic exploration - one that has included music, but also an examination into the meaning of creative fulfillment. He spoke with NewsHour Weekend’s Christopher Booker about his new book, “The Seekers.”
SUMMARY: Rock legend Tom Petty died at the age of 66 late Monday. Emerging in the late '70s, he and his band the Heartbreakers became a major fixture in rock 'n' roll with catchy songs like “Free Fallin'” that bridged both classic and newer rock sounds. Hari Sreenivasan speaks with Ann Powers of NPR about Petty's legacy.
SUMMARY: Steely Dan co-founder and guitarist Walter Becker died Sunday at 67. He formed Steely Dan in 1971 and introduced a unique sound in rock, with hits such as “Do it Again” and “Reeling' in the Years.” John Yang remembers the artist.
SUMMARY: Over three days, the legendary, era-defining Grateful Dead offered a series of final concerts at Chicago's Soldier Field. Jeffrey Brown reports on the rock band's long, strange musical trip that has inspired an almost cult-like following among its fans.
JUDY WOODRUFF (NewsHour): What a long, strange trip it’s been. After 50 years, the legendary rock band the Grateful Dead bowed out in a series of concerts this weekend. There was history, some controversy, and a whole lot more in the air. And it was, no surprise, one of the summer’s toughest tickets.
Our Jeffrey Brown was there.
JEFFREY BROWN (NewsHour): It was a weekend of extended guitar solos, era-evoking sounds, and “High Times” images updated into the digital graphics age.
There were good vibes of the multigenerational time.
MAN: It’s the last show. We have got to see it. I have got to pass that on to him.
JEFFREY BROWN: And a certain amount of nostalgia, including from band members looking back 50 years.
BILL KREUTZMANN, Grateful Dead: We were just really gung-ho, wanting to play. And that’s what — that’s how you feel about every day. Any day you had a chance to play music, you got together and played.
JEFFREY BROWN: It was all part of a major happening that played out over three days and into long nights.
It’s called “Fare Thee Well,” a series of final concerts for a band that blazed its own path on the way to becoming part of rock ‘n’ roll history. We got here to Soldier Field in Chicago ahead of the celebration to talk to some of the people who are putting it on and taking part.
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GREG KOT, The Chicago Tribune: I think the Grateful Dead were a social phenomenon as much as a musical phenomenon, and that the combination made them truly unique in rock history. I don’t there’s ever been a band quite like them.
JEFFREY BROWN: Greg Kot is music critic for The Chicago Tribune.
GREG KOT: It was a caravan. It wasn’t just a band. It was about the band and the fans. Most bands, when they go out on tour, they basically establish a set list and play the same songs in the same order every night.
The Grateful Dead never played the same songs in the same order, much less even in the same way. They reinterpreted their catalogue constantly, so every show was different.
SUMMARY: Mickey Hart, a well-known drummer for the Grateful Dead, has collaborated with astrophysicists on music that reflects the origins of the universe, and with neuroscientists to figure out how music stimulates different parts of damaged brains. Special correspondent Mike Cerre follows Hart’s exploration of music and the universe, and our human response to rhythm.
JUDY WOODRUFF (NewsHour): Tonight, we begin a two-part look at the iconic music group the group Grateful Dead, who are this week preparing for their final reunion concerts in Chicago.
First up, we focus on longtime Dead drummer Mickey Hart and his fascination with finding sounds in the most unlikely places.
Special correspondent Mike Cerre takes us on a very special trip to learn more.
MICKEY HART, Drummer, Grateful Dead: This is really the sounds of the universe. This is what the cosmos sounds like.
Pythagoras found the secrets of the universe, the rhythm of the universe, the mathematics of the universe through just a long string which vibrated. If I had any guru, it would have to be Pythagoras, and of course rhythm is the god.
MIKE CERRE (NewsHour): In the pantheon of rock ‘n’ roll gods, the Grateful Dead have always been known for their somewhat cosmic approach to music. As one of its founding drummers, Mickey Hart has spent the better part of his professional life outside of the Grateful Dead exploring the cultural and scientific basis of good vibrations.
